Transcritical cooling systems are known in the art. Such systems typically cyclically compress, cool and evaporate a refrigerant, flowing through a first side of an evaporator, where heat is absorbed during evaporation from a second side of the evaporator to cool fluid on the second side. Such systems may be used, for example, for automotive air conditioning.
In an exemplary system, there is a compressor, a condenser, and an evaporator, with a counterflow heat exchanger for exchanging heat between the fluid passing from the condenser to the evaporator and the fluid passing from the evaporator to the compressor. As shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,245,836, an integrated storage segment (liquid separator/receiver) is required in the closed fluid circuit between the evaporator and the compressor. U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,467,078, 2,530,648 and 2,990,698 illustrate combinations of heat exchanger, accumulator and metering device which may be used with such cooling systems.
The present invention is directed toward improving such transcritical cooling systems.